


in limine

by florulentae



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Professors, Day 1, Dreamscapes, M/M, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:00:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22395169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/florulentae/pseuds/florulentae
Summary: Kun goes to sleep in New York and wakes up in Madrid.This isn't the first time. It won't be the last.
Relationships: Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul | Ten/Qian Kun
Comments: 63
Kudos: 304
Collections: In Every Lifetime: A KunTen Fan Week





	in limine

**Author's Note:**

> a gigantic thank you to jay for being the most supportive angel/beta, and to kes, appia and mari for the encouragment! 
> 
> i wrote this for day #1 of kunten week, but i also (and mostly) wrote this for juji. not to get sappy where everyone can see, but even if things are a hard rigth know, i know we’ll reach our jerise, together. love you.

Kun goes to sleep in New York and wakes up in Madrid.

This isn't the first time. It won't be the last.

Here's how the story goes: a man falls asleep and wakes up in another place, another life, with the same man by his side.

It doesn’t happen every night. The dreams are spaced out: they can happen once every few months, or once every few days, or once every single day. So, the time between dreams can change, but there are some things that don't.

The cities repeat themselves; he feels like he’s traveled all through Spain, like he could draw a map of Madrid with his eyes closed, like he could name every single small town on the outskirts of the Alps, like he could name every single ahjumma selling food in the various market stalls of Busan. Sometimes, however, the cities seem to be far in the future, vast stretches of sand and hunger, or plagues of animals that _shouldn’t_ exist, but do. Other times, the most bleak times, when the dream feels more like a nightmare, they are together in a time where they can’t possibly _be_ together.

Other times, the rarest times, the man is alone. He feels a void swallow him whole as he goes about his day in a little fishing town to the south of Italy, or feels lost in the bustle of Chicago, centerless, without a North.

The man spends a day both being himself and not, speaking a language he can comprehend in dreams but can’t speak a word of in his real life, in the life he lives consciously. He goes about the day that’s been set out for him beforehand, following the motions. Sometimes, he doesn’t leave the room in which he wakes up. Other days, he works down at the docks, herds sheep, building chairs out of willow or hides from the vicious flashes of cameras.

When his day is done, he goes to bed, lies on his cot or whatever iteration of that exists in that universe. He wakes up in his _real_ world feeling mostly rested and full of longing.

Sicheng, the only person other than himself who knew about this situation—Kun is still embarrassed about how he told the story: three sheets to the wind and sobbing into the dance major’s shoulders a couple of months after meeting him—had told Kun that he thought those dreams were more like _visiting_ other versions of himself spread across the Multiverse, but Kun is more than a little skeptical of that theory. First of all, Sicheng is no astrophysicist, and second of all (perhaps most importantly) he came up with _that_ theory drunk off cheap vodka sodas the night they celebrated Kun’s acceptance into Juilliard’s grad school, soon after watching the Spiderman movie with that exact theory.

Besides, he doesn’t think this could be anything else but the product of his own fucked up subconscious, latching onto a particular face he must’ve seen only once in his life in passing and making an over twenty four-year-long adventure-slash-prank out of it.

So. Kun wakes up in Madrid. He knows this because the first thing he sees is the chipped, light blue paint of the window frames, the sheer white curtains flowing with the gentle summer breeze. In this place, he sleeps with his windows open whenever he can, eats a shit ton of _jamón crudo_ , and owns a restaurant. The place they live in is cozy, and over the ten years he’s dreamt of it, they haven’t really talked about moving.

The body curled up against his back is familiar. Always familiar in its weight, in its feel (like _home_ , like _belonging_ )—it's Ten’s. Ten, who has many names in his dreams, just like Kun does, but _always_ the same nickname.

A phone rings from Ten’s side of the bed, and Kun is amused to hear Ten startle awake, then grumble and tighten his hold on Kun’s waist.

Kun’s hands find Ten’s, and hold onto them. “Five more minutes,” he hears the other man mutter, and can’t help but smile.

“Baby, you need to get up,” Kun states, voice gentle.

“I’m the one taking pictures, they can wait for me,” Ten replies, voice raspy with sleep and lips pressed against the back of Kun’s neck. He places a wet kiss on the same spot to which he’d spoken, and Kun wiggles around, ticklish.

“Don’t be a brat—the sooner you finish, the sooner you get to come home,” Kun starts, struggling to turn around in Ten’s boa constrictor-like hold. It isn’t until Ten realizes what’s going on that he lets him shift, and Kun can turn around to face the other man. Ten’s eyes are firmly shut, and Kun smiles, fond. “And I can cook something nice for you,” Kun continues, reaching over with his left hand to comb through the hairs sticking up on Ten’s head.

Ten’s hold tightens again, because it doesn’t matter the place, the age, or anything—he’s a _clinger_. At first, Kun couldn’t understand it. Now, he revels in that fact, tucks the feeling of Ten’s touch away for a rainy day.

“I always forget you’re, like, a businessman now,” Ten says, finally opening his eyes and squinting a little, unused to the light and not being able to see much without his glasses. “You were such a nerd when we met.”

“ _Go_ , you dick,” Kun replies, no real heat behind his words. He secretly enjoys the way Ten’s face lights up in humor at the insult, the way Ten tightens his hold almost painfully for a second before letting go with a groan of protest.

“I’m getting up, I’m getting up,” Ten says, but makes no effort to release Kun from his embrace. Instead, he presses one, two, three kisses onto Kun’s lips, kisses full of comfort and familiarity, kisses that leave Kun aching whenever he wakes up the next day to an empty apartment.

God. Kun really loves Ten’s kisses.

“ _Go_ ,” Kun repeats, right after holding Ten by his cheeks and planting a big fat kiss on his lips in return.

“You are making it hard for me to,” Ten replies, before offering Kun a disarming pout.

“I’ll be here,” Kun says, poking Ten’s puckered lips.

The other man sits in bed accompanied by yet another groan, this time a louder one. He’s searching for his glasses on the top of his night table as Kun curls up on himself, pulling the thin bed sheet over himself once again, letting slumber take him for a small nap.

Here, he still has time.

* * *

Kun goes to sleep in New York and wakes up in Jerise.

This isn’t the first time.

He’s been having these dreams for more than half of his life. For some reason, Slovenia is the place he visits the most.

The first time this happened, he woke up in Sežana. Kun was sixteen and scared out of his mind. In the dream, Ten had woken him up in a panic, rambling about how he had fallen asleep and how he needed to be back home _soon_ or his mother would _kill_ him. Ten had stopped putting his clothes back on briefly to lean down and press a short but sweet kiss on Kun’s lips, mumbling something about seeing each other later. Soon, he had swiftly hopped out of the window and grabbed his bike, thrown onto the grass right under Kun’s window, with movements that spoke of familiarity with the situation.

In that dream, Kun had been late to school. His mother had the same bright eyes as she did in Kun’s real life, as she cooked up breakfast, as she pretended like she didn’t hear the ruckus Ten had made when leaving.

Ten’s smile once he spotted a disheveled Kun entering their shared classroom had been enough to quell Kun’s initial fear and turn it into something else entirely.

Now, he’s forty. He stopped dreaming about Sežana eight years ago, and the dreams transitioned to Jerise just like his life with Ten.

He’s been dreaming of a nicely sized farm, of baking bread early in the morning as a sleepy Ten does the rounds and feeds the animals, more often than not wearing Kun’s shirts or hoodies, depending on the season. He dreams of Chenle, a seven year old ray of sunshine, who loves to sleep in but loves to cook with his _baba_ and ride on his horse.

In his dream, the cold seeping through his bones as Chenle lifts the covers off from him and the whisper-yell of _baba_ are what make him blink awake. His kid is smiling brightly as he places his cold hands on Kun’s and tries to lift him up, giggling when Kun groans and, in a swift movement, pulls him into the bed, squishing him into a hug.

He can feel Ten move further onto his side of the bed, trying to escape the movement from Kun’s half, but Kun knows _that’s_ not going to work.

“How do you always manage to wake me up before my alarm rings?” Kun mumbles into Chenle’s hair, trying to cover both of them with the thick duvet once again. “You know _baba_ wakes up the earliest,” he continues, holding Chenle close as he squirms around.

“ _Daddy_ said if I woke up early, we’d get to ride on _Dream_!” Chenle whisper-yells again, stumbling in-between English and Slovenian, his fingers gripping into Kun’s pajamas tightly.

“Your _daddy_ is going to get into trouble once he wakes up,” Kun says, then laughs gently at Chenle’s pout. “Sleep some more, honey. We’ve got time— _and_ you still have school today,” Kun adds, gently petting Chenle’s hair, feeling warm all over when the kid nods, unconvinced, but trusting nonetheless. Kun hums a soft tune, watching as Chenle’s eyes close and he falls back asleep.

Behind him, Ten mumbles something ininteligible before latching onto Kun like a backpack.

This time, Kun remains wide awake.

He’s not willing to trade seconds of sleep inside his dream for seconds with Ten and Chenle.

When Kun wakes up in New York after what feels like a lifetime later, his back aches like he’s been exposed to the winter cold in the middle of the summer of his world.

He’s alone in bed, like always.

There’s a gaping hole in his heart.

Like always.

* * *

Kun goes to sleep and wakes up in New York.

This is the first time.

He wakes up alone in an apartment that’s roughly the size of his own, but filled with sleek furniture, splashes of color and life, pots of plants and paintings making the place seem lived in.

He wakes up alone, but there’s a covered plate waiting for him on the counter as he stumbles half asleep into the kitchen—clad only in the first pair of boxers he had found on the floor of the bedroom—along with a sticky note taped to the fridge.

_hope you like this, sleepy head :)_ is written in neat handwriting, followed by _you can stay in for as long as you’d like; i’ll be back soon_ in a more rushed, slanted penmanship.

Kun lifts the other plate that’s covering the actual food, and smiles at the omelet that waits for him, grins at what is supposed to be a smiley face drawn in ketchup on the right side of the plate.

He eats breakfast in a daze, sitting on the kitchen counter and balancing the plate on his thighs. His eyes are trying to absorb everything about the place Ten lives in in this dream, reveling in the little things that remind Kun of the Tens he has met before.

Once he’s done with that, he does what he’s learned to do over the years of dreaming about Ten: go to the bathroom, find a mirror. Start to piece together the life he’s been thrown into.

In the mirror, a younger version of himself greets him. _Hello again_ , Kun thinks, a hand combing through the bleached hair he had for one rebellious month in his freshman year of university. In this dream, he’s not quite as young as that; he’s twenty or so—the details are always fuzzy initially, when it’s his first time in a place. The skin of his face is smoother, his arms slightly more toned, his chest covered in bruises the size of a mouth he’d recognize with his eyes closed.

Kun goes to sleep and wakes up in New York.

This is the first time.

It also isn’t his New York.

He realizes this as he stares down the big windows, clad only in grey sweatpants that had been discarded near the bed the night before. The buildings are all in the wrong place, in the wrong color— _this_ building he is in shouldn’t even exist. Yet there’s something familiar about the city’s air, something that reminds him of the home he’s built over the years without Ten.

Regardless, he spends his day in the apartment that he knows is not home, yet by now he can map out every nook and cranny. He scrolls through his phone, sitting on the sofa, with his bare feet up the coffee table.

He’s doing a good job of piecing together his life here: he’s twenty three, works at his parents’ laundromat; he met Ten—who is a _whole_ two years older than him in this corner of this world—a year ago at a gathering hosted by Johnny, a man that looks (and is named) exactly like one of the professors at the English department that Kun has somehow befriended despite being in a totally different faculty in the university he works at in his waking life.

Oddly enough, he has no obligations for today. Maybe that’s why he slept over the night before.

In this dream, Ten and Kun aren’t together, but they see each other quite often. He still can’t figure out what’s holding himself—or this particular iteration of himself—back from being with Ten.

It’s hours later when Ten arrives, with the sun setting and a flurry of life that Kun is more than used to. Kun can see from his place on the sofa how Ten does his best to balance after opening the door, hands full with grocery bags and what looks to be a box from a bakery. He hears Ten curse under his breath when he misses the keyhole trying to lock the door, then shriek in surprise when Kun’s laughter rings through the open space.

Kun’s laugh is louder now, as he gets up in a swift movement to relieve Ten of some of the bags he’s holding, taking them to the kitchen. Ten succeeds in closing the door, Kun can tell by the _hoot_ of victory the other man lets out, and follows Kun into the kitchen.

“You’re here,” Ten says after placing the bags he was carrying next to the ones Kun had taken care of, and Kun can hear the wonder in his voice. Ten moves so he’s standing in front of Kun, moves like he’s trying to get closer to a skittish animal.

“Why would I leave? You asked me to stay,” Kun says, matter-of-factly. His hands find Ten’s waist.

Ten chuckles, lifting his hand so it’s resting on Kun’s jaw. “Sometimes you do,” he says, and his voice sounds a little rough. “But I’ll always find you.”

“That sounds like a promise,” Kun states. He’s smiling, and he internally breathes a sigh of relief when Ten mirrors his smile. He figures this is just the push the Kun of _this_ world needs to get his shit together. He’s doing him a _favor_.

“It _is_ a promise,” Ten replies, and his other hand finds its place around Kun’s neck. He pulls Kun in for a kiss that makes Kun’s toes curl, that makes his spine tingle. He closes his eyes, focusing only on the feeling of Ten’s plush lips against his, on the warmth of Ten’s skin once his hands sneak under his layers of clothing.

He opens his eyes.

He’s on his side, and the small digital clock on his bedside table shows him the numbers 11:11am in bright red.

Just like that, the dream is gone.

* * *

“I’m starting to hate these things,” Kun grumbles, grimacing as he takes the last sip of cheap champagne in his hands and right before placing the glass on the nearest table. It’s a week before classes formally start, and for the sake of his reputation, he’s in this particularly stuffy hotel ballroom.

“Too early for that, Kun,” Sicheng says, beside him. His glass is half full. Kun supposes that that’s quite fitting for their situation. “Besides, we’ve got new people to meet and mingle with,” he continues, eyes shining with an amusement Kun has learnt not to trust.

“Oh, _fun_ ,” Kun replies, voice dripping with sarcasm as he fixes his watch and smooths down the places where his dress shirt had bunched up.

“Wow, Dejun was right—you _are_ becoming an old man— _Ow_!” Sicheng’s whisper-yell of pain after Kun reaches over to pinch his side makes Kun want to throttle him.

He also thinks about how amazing it is that, after knowing each other for so long, things haven’t changed. They still resort to the same playful and easy banter that brought them together in the first place, twenty years later.

“You are a _year_ younger than me!” Kun whisper-yells in retaliation, coughing and straightening his back once he sees a professor he’s pretty sure should’ve retired two years ago squinting at him. “Stop listening to my T.A,” Kun continues, slapping Sicheng’s shoulder playfully once the other man rolls his eyes.

“Your soul is old and—oh, there’s Yongqin,” Sicheng says, motioning for someone somewhere behind Kun to come over with movements that are totally not subtle and would make Kun laugh if he weren’t facing a minor crisis. “He’s the new guy in my department, I think you’ll actually _like_ him,” Sicheng prattles on, but his words sound distant over the roar of Kun’s heartbeat.

He’s heard that name before.

Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul. Li Yongqin. Lee Youngheum. They are all one and the same— _Ten_.

Kun can’t hear the person approaching him over the conversation and soft music that fills the space, but he can feel it in his toes, can _feel_ someone’s eyes on him.

He tries to be reasonable. There are more chances that that’s literally _anyone_ else but the man he’s been dreaming about for more than half of his life.

But there he _fucking_ is. Kun can see him from the corner of his eye as he cheerfully greets Sicheng.

Holy _shit_.

Sicheng, blissfully unaware of the hurricane of emotions whirling in Kun, pats Ten on the back, and quickly introduces them.

“Yongqin, this is Kun, the friend I told you about,” he says, and Ten is now facing Kun, a small smile on his lips, eyes shining with something Kun has realized over the years means no matter what he says, nothing will match what Ten feels inside.

He saw that same look in Sežana, when Ten first held Chenle. He saw that look in Madrid, when Kun had finished helping him move into their brand new home. He saw that look in Bangkok, when Kun had visited Ten’s mother’s house and ended up drunk off cherry wine with her, trying his best to communicate in Thai, trying to tell her just how much he loved Ten and how he was ready to marry him if she allowed him to.

He’s seeing it _now_ , wide awake. Kun finds that nothing he’s ever dreamt of can compare to the real deal, to the real Ten that is standing _right in front of him._

“Pleasure to meet you,” Ten says, measured. Like he’s been waiting for this to happen. Kun wouldn’t put it past him to somehow _know_ that this was going to happen. He stretches his hand for Kun to shake, and Kun’s heartbeat rings in his ears as he takes it.

Kun clears his throat. “Likewise,” he replies, relieved when his voice doesn’t come out squeaky, tone managing to be even.

“ _Oh_ , Mark’s over there!” Sicheng says, and Kun curses the fact that the younger man has the attention span of a very excited golden retriever when he’s on a mingling mission, _especially_ if it involves ignoring all of the boring white men well into their 70s. “I’ll be right back!” Sicheng adds and before Kun can beg for his mercy, or say he has to run to the bathroom and just leave the establishment—like the very dignified man he is—Sicheng is _gone_ and Kun is still holding onto Ten’s hand.

Ten hasn’t let go either.

"I know you," Ten declares, wasting no time.

_Of course_.

Kun laughs nervously. “I don’t think we’ve met before,” he answers, because it’s just not possible that Ten can simply _know_. This is the first time they’ve ever seen each other in the waking world; he can’t just dump a twenty-four-year long story and hope that the other man won’t think he’s a weirdo.

"Hong Kong, Madrid, Jerise, Busan, Terlano—I _know_ you," Ten’s voice is insistent, his face resolute, and Kun thinks that all of his stars are fucking aligned now.

Because Ten is not only real and right there with him. Because Ten _knows_ him in the way Kun knows Ten.

And that feels like his one true miracle.

“Oh my _God_ , it’s _you_ ,” Kun barely manages to choke out, before Ten is pulling him into a hug that feels just like coming home, a hug that is both so _Ten_ and so _new_ , so much better than anything he’s ever dreamt of, because it’s _real._

“We have so much to talk about,” Ten mumbles against the crook of Kun’s neck, as Kun’s hands hold him steadily, the noise and people surrounding them simply fading into the background.

“My place is close,” Kun says, pulling back slightly, every single nerve of his body screaming at him to get back into Ten’s embrace. It’s true—it’s the only reason why he came in the first place. “I’ll just have to tell Sicheng and—”

“Text him,” Ten says, grinning brightly as he separates from Kun enough to pull him by their still joined hands through the entrance. “We have twenty four years to catch up on.”

* * *

“How did you know it was me?” Kun asks, hours later, after talking and talking and _talking_ had given way for their bodies to fit together like puzzle pieces, like they always knew how to.

Now, they are tangled up together in bed, nothing but a thin bed sheet covering them, with the moonlight and the shitty lamp on his bedside table as the sole witnesses to their first encounter in this _real_ world.

"I would recognize that ass anywhere," Ten says with a serious face, but the amused tilt of his lips betrays him.

" _Fuck_ , it really is you," Kun exclaims, amazed.

"In the flesh," Ten replies, and he sounds as playful as he always does, but there’s something about the genuineness of his smile, the pure joy of it that makes Kun’s heart beat in double time.

"I never thought…" Kun trails off, the pad of his fingers brushing against Ten's cheek in a gentle caress. _I never thought you were real,_ he thinks. _Most of the dreams were too good to be true. Even in the bad ones, I got to meet you, and that was enough for me._ “That I could have this,” Kun says instead.

“I waited for you in Beijing,” Ten confesses, his left hand reaching over to play with Kun’s hair. “For ten years I taught there, because I had this hunch that that’s where you’d be. But you never showed up, and I got the offer to work here and now—”

“Here you are,” Kun says, in awe. He untangles himself from Ten’s embrace, ignoring Ten’s little noise of protest, so he can lift himself up enough to put his hands on the mattress, right beside Ten’s shoulders, so he can sit on top of Ten and feel the warmth of his skin.

The kiss Kun presses on Ten’s lips is nothing short of scorching. Ten’s nails dig into Kun’s shoulder blades as successfully pulls the other man down so they are pressed together, inch for inch.

“Here I am,” Ten says, breathless, eyes locked with Kun’s, unmoving, beautiful. “Forever.”

It’s a promise.

&

Kun falls into bed with Ten in New York and doesn't sleep until dawn breaks.

&

Kun goes to bed in New York and wakes up in his New York.

He doesn’t dream, and yet—

He wakes up, and Ten is still holding onto him.

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me @[twitter](https://twitter.com/florulentae) and [cc](https://curiouscat.me/poetarum) ♡


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